size and relation of molecules. The lecturer | bered and is allowed undue weight, while the seems to have followed Professor Tyndall in thousands of cases in which great men have his course of lectures to the same audience, had mediocre descendants are practically igand to have imitated his methods of presenta- nored--indeed, the argument sometimes makes tion of the subject very closely. Thus the us ask what cannot heredity be made to do? imagination is largely drawn upon, and the A great man has clever children, see here a author's conceptions with regard to the inti- case of heredity; he has, as is more usual, very mate constitution of substances are far more commonplace ones, see here a case of reverdefinite than strict reasoning will warrant. sion to ancestral types. But the author gives This method will probably call forth the just enough facts for a fair criticism of his argucriticism of the conservatives of the science, ment, and we think those facts show that but the volume is decidedly more interesting heredity has the strongest influence in the than if the more strictly scientific method lower parts of man's being, in the body and were followed. Apart from the method and the sensations that are intimately related manner referred to there is nothing new in thereto; but as we ascend the scale and deal this volume, but it is a very readable presen- with the intellect and the will, the power of tation of the more striking phenomena which hereditary influences, though not absent, is have occupied physicists and chemists, ex- lessened, and the characteristics of the indiviplained in a manner very consonant with mo- dual gain proportionately. We would heartily dern theories. commend this book to the careful consideration of our readers. Heredity. From the French of T. RIBOT. H. S. King and Co. This is a translation of a book that may be said to take the place in modern French literature that Galton's Hereditary Genius' does in English, and we cannot honestly say that the foreign production compares unfavourably with the native one. Less copious and laboured than Galton's, it excels in logical precision, and goes more fully into the deductions | that may be drawn from established facts. To opposing metaphysical theories, idealist or materialist, the author is on the whole fair, pointing out both the strength and weakness of the case for each; and although, towards the close of the book, we see he is not altogether free from what might be called materialistic bias, he shows clearly enough how easily the facts can be made to fit a more spiritual philosophy. After a short résumé of what is known as to physiological heredity, quoting facts and statistics from the works of Darwin, Lucas, and Maudsley, the writer asks if similar facts can be found in the psychological domain. To obtain an affirmative answer Monsieur Ribot examines the evidence for the heredity of the five senses; in this same physiological department, of course, the evidences are strong, stronger, we think, than he finds them when he passes on to the higher ground of mind. However, he quotes all the evidence he can find in favour of the heredity of memory and imagination, the latter in the cases of families of poets, painters, and musicians, of intellect in men of science, philosophers, and political economists, and of the sentiments, the passions, and the will. He adds a couple of chapters on the errible subject of the inheritance of diseases of body and mind, and of criminal tendencies. The whole of this part of the book is well done, and the writer shows a most praiseworthy desire not to overestimate the value of his facts, but he does not, we think, sufficiently take account of the facts that tell against him; a single case, such as that of James and John Stuart Mill, in which it is quite impossible to say what is due to heredity proper and what to education and circumstances, is remem Lessons in Elementary Mechanics, Introductory to the Study of Physical Science, with numerous examples. By PHILIP MAGNUS, B.Sc, B.A. Longmans, Green, and Co. These lessons are well arranged. Their peculiarity is that the laws of motion and elements of dynamics, with their postulates, and demonstrations, and results, are treated before the doctrine of equilibrium and of mechanical advantage. As the idea of rest is a resultant of the activity of conflicting forces, and the idea of motion is more capable of illustration than that of statical repose, we think Mr. Magnus has done well in constructing his lessons' for beginners on that principle. The demonstrations are lucid, and the examples abundantly sufficient to prepare a candidate for London matriculation. The book might be used for the purpose of a 'cram,' but it is far too good a book to be thus degraded. Our Sketching Club: Letters and Studies in Landscape Art. By the Rev. R. ST. JOHN TYRWHITT, M.A., with an Authorized Reproduction of the Lessons and Woodcuts of Professor Ruskin's 'Elements of Drawing.' Macmillan and Co. Mr. Tyrwhitt has done for landscape drawing what M. Viollet-le-Duc has done for house building: he has disguised the pill of scientific instruction in the jam of a slight fiction adorned with a good deal of vivid and pleasant descriptions, not of nature only, but of sport and agriculture. He tells us how his book grew. Messrs. Roberts, of Boston, requested him to write an elementary book on landscape, to be made palatable by means of descriptive and verbal sketches, and to take the form of transactions of a sketching club. There was also to be some love-making and some foxhunting. Messrs. Macmillan having seen the first two parts of the work, agreed to publish it in England. Professor Ruskin gave it the imprimatur of his high authority, with leave to use any of the blocks and instructions of his Elements of Drawing.' Is further commendation necessary? The book is excellent as a guide to art-study, and amusing as a book of general description. Its literary skill is on Population' which suggested to Darwin considerable. The author has successfully the idea of natural selection through the strugcombined elements not often found in combi-gle for existence; and so one hypothesis led nation, and provided equally for the young student and the book club. The Doctrine of Descent and Darwinism. By OSCAR SCHMIDT, Professor in the University of Strasburg. Henry S. King and Co. Ever since mankind has consciously laboured in the field of intellect pre-eminent men have existed, who, reasoning more rapidly than their contemporaries, have outstripped them in the apprehension of great truths and the recognition of important laws. But it is a great temptation to set too high a value on these anticipations, and in all cases in which their intellectual exploits are concerned it will be discovered that, so to speak, they floated in the air, and that it was merely a keener scent and a so-called intuition, resting on unconscious inferences, which exalted the privileged being above his less sharp-sighted neighbour.' In these remarks, which we have quoted from our author, he has, as we think, answered himself. His thesis is the decay of the old creationist hypothesis, based on the transcendental idea of a Deus opifex, and the rise in its room of the new evolution theory of the universe, based on the immanent theory of God as the anima mundi. Into the metaphysical or theological bearings of the question we need not enter here, they are discussed in another section of our present number. The author writes as a physiologist, and though, like most Germans, even his physiological views are largely tinged with metaphysics, yet we need not consider them here. It is the Darwinian hypothesis, as such, on which he professes to treat, and to his discussion of it we may confine our remarks. Darwinism and development!-it is difficult to touch the subject without treading on the still hot ashes of controversies not extinct; but the demands of science are inexorable. It is geology, and especially that branch of it known since Agassiz's time as paleontology, which forces us on to some conclusion as to whether the existing fauna and flora are the descendants or not of extinct but analogous forms of the same. It is this uniformitarian theory of geology, as opposed to the old catastrophic, which leads us on to the conclusion that the existing forms of life are only evolutions from those which are extinct. There is nothing new in all this, nor does Professor Oscar Schmidt contribute anything original to the discussion on Darwinism. His chief merit is that he points out the filiation of ideas on the subject, and the way in which one branch of science opens the door to the other. It was the controversy between the Vulcanists and Neptunists, at the end of the last century, which led to Cuvier's great discoveries of the animals of the tertiary formation in the vicinity of Paris. This, again, led on to Lamarck's generalization of the gradual development of distinct types from a single ancestor; and thus, step by step, the way was prepared for Darwin's theory. It was Malthus on to another, until we reach the conclusion which is formulated in the Origin of Species.' These lectures of Professor Oscar Schmidt on the evolution theory were doubtless prepared for, and delivered to his classes in the newly-founded University of Strasburg. They are a sign of the intellectual activity which has already set in there since that ancient German town has been recovered for the Fatherland. Mr. King has done well to introduce them into the International Scientific Series which he is now publishing. It impresses one with the strides which physical science is making in our day, that whereas to Linnæus less than a century ago the axiom of creation from a single pair was self-evident-Reason teaches,' he says, 'that at the beginning of things a pair of each particular species was created;' we now reject the idea of a beginning at all, or of the formation of a single pair of each species, or even of creation itself in the old sense of the word. The lesson we have to learn from these revolutions in our scientific conceptions of the beginning of things is that these conceptions are, after all, only pale reflections of the reality itself. We are like the dwellers in Plato's cavern mistaking the shadows on the wall for the substances themselves. We have to fall back on the teaching of the Epistle to the Hebrews. By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the Word of God; so that the things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.', Students' Edition. By ROBERT CAMPBELL. John Murray. Few books are more incapable of abridgment, as regards their substance, than Mr. Austin's celebrated and standard 'Lectures on Jurisprudence;' and yet few more obviously abound in extraneous matter, which might be omitted without detriment to the main purpose of the work. This abridgment, proceeding as it does on the principle of eliminating what is extraneous, and prepared by the editor of the former work, will be hailed with satisfaction by the student of jurisprudence. Austin on Jurisprudence. On first perusal the diminution in size of the present volume appears almost magical. We read paragraph after paragraph familiar to us from the larger work; nothing appears omitted. A closer examination only produces surprise at the extent of abridgment, which has been effected by the omission of interjected remarks and small digressions. Mr. Campbell has also exercised his discretion in making a judiciously sparing revision of some parts of the original text; as, for instance, he has summarized, in his short Outline' at the end, the somewhat incoherent Notes and Fragments.' Again, his total omission of the statement that acts are divisible, as acts internal' and 'acts external,' and of the subsequent notice and renunciation of that statement, which are contained in the larger work, is certainly an improvement, and relieves the student from the necessity of learning, and then unlearning, this exploded idea. Although the admirer of Austin may prefer the two volumes of his lectures on account of the glimpses they give of their author's strong political and social views, yet the student of Jurisprudence will find this handy volume far more suitable to his purpose. Laocoon. Translated from the Text of Lessing. With Preface and Notes by the Right Hon. Sir ROBERT PHILLIMORE, D.C.L. Mac millan and Co. observations on these and other points, but the essential elements of scientific comprehensiveness and clearness are wanting. There is the promise of much, and on entering on the perusal of the book curiosity is stimulated and expectation beats high. The performance unfortunately is not equal to the promise. There is throughout a lack of definiteness and an obscurity in idea, through transparent attempts at over-subtlety. The consequence is, the reader feels himself at every page stopping to ask what the writer really means, and where he is likely to take him. There is a precision in the Lessing's 'Laocoon' has long since passed 'form' of the exposition with which there is into the rank of works which lie beyond the little correspondence in the 'matter,' and there influence of the periodical critic. Its place is is a good deal which tempts the question, Cui fixed in literature, not only by its inherent bono? In addition to this, Mr. Renton's own merits, but also by its historical connections, style is far from perfect. It is jerky and unand the effects it has produced upon other wri- even, with a good deal of impetuosity; but the ters. It is one of the few books which educate force which drives it is spasmodic, so that his the teachers of men in art criticism. Its influ- sentences drop upon us as if 'shot from a culence, immense though it was in Germany, has vereen.' There is also an air of dogmatism been almost equally great throughout Europe, which irritates without providing satisfaction; so that it may be said of it that it has done in and the reader at length feels tempted to ask the domain of æsthetic culture what Smith's where is the justification for the philosophic 'Wealth of Nations' did in political economy-superiority which seems to be claimed on every opened a new epoch. It has (Sir R. Phillimore says truly) leavened not only the teaching and the practice of professors of art and practical artists, but, like other great works, it has purified the taste and informed the minds of many, who have benefited by the streams flowing in various channels from a fountainhead which they have never visited.' In presenting Lessing's great masterpiece in an Eng-over-hasty in rushing into print before he has lish garb, Sir R. Phillimore has performed a thought out the subject which has presented labour of love; and the learning of the pre- itself to him with considerable freshness and face and notes, with the gracefulness of the force. The consequence is a tendency to deal translation, sufficiently testify to his admirable in merely verbal subtleties, which is trying to capacity for his task. Any other testimony is the patience of the reader, and a clothing of unnecessary. The common love of Homer,' what are sometimes commonplace remarks in which leads him to inscribe his work to Mr. philosophical phraseology, which gives the Gladstone, has found ample satisfaction in this aspect of scientific precision and comprehenvolume; and, much as he has done to lay stu- siveness without the reality. If Mr. Renton dents of art-criticism under a debt of obliga- would secure the ear of the public, he must tion that will not be grudgingly acknowledged, have more substance and Inhalt in those Sir R. Phillimore would doubtless say truly knock-down sentences of his, and his essays that he has found his work itself its own exwill gain if he doffs the dogmatic cloak, and ceeding great reward. sets himself to instruct and guide without always flourishing his baton in his reader's face. His essay gives good promise, but we await The Logic of Style; being an Introduction to In this little volume Mr. Renton has broken what may almost be described as virgin soil. He calls it 'An Introduction to Critical Science,' and it is strictly what is described. The writer shows that such a science is possible, and indicates some of the lines on which it must proceed, rather than seriously attempts to construct the science. Even this qualified and much smaller task, however, is both difficult and ambitious, and requires an amount of expository power of which Mr. Renton scarcely seems possessed. He has grasped the idea of style as the vehicle of expression, and is able to indicate the possibility of reducing the conditions of style in this relation to scientific precision. The thoughtful reader will feel grateful to him for the suggestiveness of his B-20 VOL. LXI. page; while the sharp manner in which the sentences are rapped out, and thrown at him. as it were, do not tend to put him on better terms with his instructor. We use this plainness of speech because we think Mr. Renton has powers of no slight turned to excellent account. description, which, by careful culture, may be He has been the fulfilment. POETRY, FICTION, AND BELLES LETTRES.. The Old Manor House, and other Poems. By ADA CAMBRIDGE. Daldy, Isbister, and Co. Miss Cambridge is well known as the author of some hymns of such purity, fervour, and music, as have given them a place in most hymn books. Though a large section of this volume consists of hymns, there is not one that has the unity of thought and adequate final expression that would lead us to rank it with the best of her earlier efforts-and one of: them is in form offensively colloquial and free: troductions and Notes. By DAVID MASSON, M.A., LL.D. Two Vols. Macmillan and Co. In these two volumes of the Golden Treasury series the publishers have supplied us with an edition of Milton's poetical works which, for thorough scholarship, scrupulous accuracy, skilful and learned annotation, and portable elegance, are worthy companions to the Globe Shakespeare. All that can be done for our two supreme national poets has been done in in phrasing. Instead, however, we have love- | The Poetical Works of John Milton: with Inpoems, and poems on domestic themes, which, in spite of occasional roughnesses of metre, are admirable. The theme of the Old Manor House' partly reminds us of that of 'Locksley Hall,' but the treatment is wholly dissimilar; and the expedient of following the hero in his wanderings in search of relief and escape from the sense of disappointment, affords ample room for the exercise of the author's descriptive powers. The great want of the poem is a proper climax. Some of the shorter pieces are almost perfect in their way, as, for example, Awake.' Miss Cambridge's genius is essentially lyrical; and within a limited range she touches most naturally the quiet, domestic sentiments, and she can give truthful utterance to certain phases of love, but strong passion masters her rather than the reverse. She is, however, on the whole true, she instinctively knows the limits of her genius, and most often respects it; and that itself is one half of art. The Tower of Babel. A Poetical Drama. By ALFRED AUSTIN. William Blackwood and Sons. The If a poet travels so completely into the land of myth and allegory as to lay the scenes of his drama in the land of Shinar while the Tower of Babel was rising in mad defiance of heaven, and to blend the loves of supernatural and angelic dwellers in the ether to the daughters of men, with modern science and nineteenth century philosophy, the fastidious will not be much satisfied with the composite performance. Here is, however, some strong and daring speculation, while a world of curious suggestion is involved in the dedication 'To all pure descendants of Afrael and Noëma. process of the intermingling of the angelic power and earthly intelligence, the rise of passion in the ethereal visitor, the feeling of illicit affection which surprises the lawful wife and earthly mother into rapturous longing for her angelic visitant, transgresses the limits of reasonable allegory, but the fire and the dash of the verse hurry the reader forward. The destruction of the Tower by lightning—a catastrophe in which the lover-spirit seems to take some part, and in which the husband of Noëma falls a blackened corpse-is finely told; but the poem as a whole does not please us. The lyrical portions are much below the character of the rest of the work, while the angelic singer from whose lips they issue ought to have ensured for them very special effort of thought, music, and diction. In Memoriam. By ALFRED TENNYSON. Henry This volume completes the cabinet edition of Tennyson's works, which, more extensive editions notwithstanding, must be regarded as the most useful as well as elegant yet published-as certainly it is the most complete. It presents the Idylls of the King' in their orderly and permanent arrangement-and contains several new poems. If we had to choose from among the manifold editions of the Laureate's works, we should unhesitatingly choose this. these editions. We have texts as accurate as they are likely to be, and we have all the lights upon the text that learned research and critical sagacity are likely to furnish. Dr. Masson's name must henceforth be inseparably associated with Milton as English literature will know him. His 'Golden Treasury' edition is in its annotations an abbreviation of the superb Cambridge edition published contemporaneously with it, and which we noticed in our last number. To most readers these reduced annotations will be sufficient for all literary purposes, and the two volumes will henceforth be the standard popular edition of the poet's works. A new memoir, however, has been prepared for this edition, so as to make it complete. This also, which extends over seventy pages, will be abundantly sufficient for ordinary information. Of course, it is founded upon Professor Masson's greater biography, which, when completed, will be the classical record of the poet and his times. We heartily thank Dr. Masson for his noble labours in the elucidation of Milton's life and works. Shakespeare's Centurie of Prayse. Being Materials for a History of Opinion on Shakespeare and his Works, culled from Writers of the first Century after his Rise. For the Editor: Trübner and Co. speare the cover of this book but is omitted from the The name of Mr. C. M. Ingleby is put on title-page. Its construction and character are with the earliest known biblical (as distinsufficiently described by the title. Beginning guished from documentary) allusions to Shakeed to have referred to him as The upstart in 1592, when Robert Green is supposcrow,' it ends with 1693, which includes Dryden's 'Epistle to Sir Godfrey Kneller,' which vided by the author into four periods, the was written in that year. This century is difirst extending to 1616, the year of Shakespeare's death; the second to the outbreak of the Civil War, in 1642; the third to the Restoration, in 1660; the fourth to 1693, which the author designates the period of 'the rise of criticism.' This century he deems the growing period of Shakespeare's fame, after which he became a classic. There is scope for almost interminable criticism on the passages quoted, and on their real or supposed allusions to Shakespeare. Something of this Mr. Ingleby has attempted in elucidations and notes appended to each period, which, of course, are convincing in various degrees. Pepys' criticisms will serve as well as any to indicate the amusing judgments which his immediate critics bestowed upon the great dramatist 'Mar. 1, 1661. To the opera, and there saw "Romeo and Juliet" the first time it was ever acted [but it is a play of itself the worst that ever I heard, and the worst acted that ever I saw people do]. September 29, 1662. To the King's Theatre, where we saw "Midsummer's Night's Dream," which I had never seen before, nor shall ever again, for it is the most insipid, ridiculous play that ever I saw in my life. So "Twelfth Night" is but a silly play.' The much cried-up play of "Henry the Eighth" is so simple a thing made up of a great many patches, that besides the shows and processions in it there is nothing in the world good, or well done.' "Othello, Moor of Venice," seems a mean thing compared with "The Adventures of Five Houres." "The Merry Wives of Windsor" did not please me at all, in no part of it.'"The Tempest" has no great wit, but yet above ordinary plays.' So much for the literary judgment of our ancestors. The author is an enthusiast, and his sanguine interest sometimes sways his judgment. He has, however, compiled a most interesting catena of contemporary and early allusions to Shakespeare, in which we may see how his genius produced its first impressions. Shakespeare: A Critical Study of His Mind and Art. By EDWARD DOWDEN, LL.D. Henry S. King and Co. common sense and Teutonic culture and idea- Sketches of Old Times and Distant Places. 'Doctor's orders' are not always so fruitful of benefit to the public as they have been in Archdeacon Sinclair's case. In 1868, when he was advised to suspend his usual occupations,' he carried with him to Lowestoft a bundle of papers, which he then began to arrange, and which have grown into the volume now before us. In the course of his long and useful life, he has been exceptionally fortunate in meeting with great men and ‘originals.' And his benevolent and active-minded father, Sir John Sinclair, had been the same before him, so that in collecting anecdotes and reminiscences, he was only, so to say, adding to the family capital, the cream of which we now have here. Added to quick observation and a retentive memory, Archdeacon Sinclair possessed real appreciation of character. and the tact of curtailment. Next to Dean Ramsay's unique book, we should rank this volume. Sir Walter Scott, David Hume, Rev. Archibald Alison (author of the work on 'Taste,' and father of the historian), Dr. Chalmers, Marshal Macdonald, Sir William Hamilton, Lord Erskine, and several others, are here vividly presented to us, and fresh light is frequently cast on their lives in the most attractive way. It seems easy to tell an anecdote; hardly anything is more difficult than to do it well. All depends on duly accenting the characteristic point, and this implies sympathy, humour, naturalness, and good taste, a combination not very common after all. Archdeacon Sinclair sets down his anecdotes well, and certainly much would have been lost to the public if he had adhered to his first idea of issuing the book only to friends. The anecdotes are so good that we must give one or two: This is an endeavour to elicit from the works of the world's worthiest poet some knowledge of the intellectual and moral development of the author, and to determine in some measure, by internal evidence, the succession if not the chronology of the dramas of Shakespeare. The work is genial, appreciative, and well toned, glowing with admiration of the humanity of the Stratford singer, full of passionate enthusiasm for his genius, and notable for its sustained excellence of phrase, and adequate acquaintance with the literature of the subject. Dr. Dowden belongs to the new school of Shakespeare critics who, apparently, despair of learning how he comported himself as a youth in the Midlands, as a poet in the metropolis, and as a tithe-farmer in the country town of his birth; and, turning disappointedly from the scanty record of the outward incidents of his biography, seek to search into the secrets of his inner life, in the hope of thus 'Soon after William, first Earl of Dudley, solving the sphinx-like enigma which Shake- had succeeded to the title of Dudley and Ward, speare's life presents to the student. He re- a lady asked Lord Castlereagh how he accountgards Romeo and Juliet' and 'Hamlet' as ed for the custom of speaking to himself into types of the poet's emotional and intellectual which he had fallen. "It is only Dudley speaknature, and his life as a passage from the stiring to Ward," was his ready answer to her inand passion of the one to the keenly-balanced vibrations of the other. His criticisms of the main plays of the respective periods of the social comedy, the historic drama, the intense tragedy, and the calm closing years of his accumulated power in all the forms of the drama, are marked by subtlety and insight. Though the professor of English literature in the University of Dublin has wisely studied the best German critics, and properly profited by the perusal of their writings, he has been able to hold the balance steady between English quiry.' When Sheridan was once on the hustings, an ugly fellow, raised on the shoulders of the mob, addressed him, "Unless you mend your ways I shall withdraw my countenance from you." "I am glad to hear it," replied Sheridan, "for an uglier countenance I never saw." 'Before Sir Walter Scott acknowledged himself to be the author of the "Waverley Novels," my sister Catherine said to him-"If you tell me which of these novels you prefer, I shall tell you in return which of them has the pre |